1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is a surgical device. More specifically, it is a circumferential ablation device assembly which is adapted to ablate a selected circumferential region of tissue which is located either along a pulmonary vein wall, which forms a circumferential conduction block against conduction along the longitudinal axis of the pulmonary vein wall, or along a left posterior atrial wall which surrounds a pulmonary vein ostium and electrically isolates the vein and the ostium from the rest of the atrium.
2. Description of Related Art
Many abnormal medical conditions in humans and other mammals have been associated with disease and other aberrations along the lining or walls which define several different body spaces. In order to treat such abnormal wall conditions of the body spaces, medical device technologies adapted for delivering specific forms of ablative energy to specific regions of targeted wall tissue from within the associated body space have been developed and disclosed.
The terms "body space," including derivatives thereof, is herein intended to mean any cavity or lumen within the body which is defined at least in part by a tissue wall. For example, the cardiac chambers, the uterus, the regions of the gastrointestinal tract, and the arterial or venous vessels are all considered illustrative examples of body spaces within the intended meaning.
The term "lumen," including derivatives thereof, is herein intended to mean any body space which is circumscribed along a length by a tubular tissue wall and which terminates at each of two ends in at least one opening that communicates externally of the body space. For example, the large and small intestines, the vas deferens, the trachea, and the fallopian tubes are all illustrative examples of lumens within the intended meaning. Blood vessels are also herein considered lumens, including regions of the vascular tree between their branch points. More particularly, the pulmonary veins are lumens within the intended meaning, including the region of the pulmonary veins between the branched portions of their ostia along a left ventricle wall, although the wall tissue defining the ostia typically presents uniquely tapered lumenal shapes.
Atherosclerosis, a vascular disease characterized by abnormal deposits upon vessel walls or thickening thereof, is an example of an abnormal wall condition. The dangers related to flow blockages or functional occlusions resulting from the disease have made atherosclerosis the focus of many disclosed devices. Such devices can be categorized by their structures and tissue treatment mechanisms. These categories may include direct contact electrode devices, resistance heating devices, light transmission/conversion-to-heat devices, hot fluid lumen devices, and radio frequency (RF) heated devices.
Several direct (or nearly direct) contact electrode devices have been disclosed. U.S. Pat. No. 4,998,933 to Eggers et al. describes a catheter designed for thermal angioplasty which utilizes a heated electrode in direct contact with surrounding tissue or plaque deposits as a mechanism for treating the diseased lumen walls. U.S. Pat. No. 4,676,258 to InoKuchi et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 4,807,620 to Strul et al. disclose devices designed to treat surrounding tissues using heat generated by two electrodes within the device and an RF power source.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,672,962 to Hershenson and U.S. Pat. No. 5,035,694 to Kasprzyk et al. disclose devices which may be categorized as resistance heating probes. In each of these devices, current flowing through a conductive material at the end of the device provides heat which is transmitted to surrounding tissues for treatment of atherosclerosis and other diseases. Current is transmitted in each of these devices by electrically conductive materials. In contrast, U.S. Pat. No. 5,226,430 to Spears et al. discloses a device which uses light transmitting fiber to transmit energy to a heat generating element at the tip of the device. The heat generating element in that device transmits heat energy to a surrounding balloon structure which is in contact with surrounding tissue. In further contrast, U.S. Pat. No. 4,790,311 to Ruiz discloses an angioplasty catheter system wherein a heat generating electrode at the tip of the device is heated using the transmission of RF energy. This device may be categorized as an RF heated device.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,190,540 and 5,292,321 to Lee can be categorized as hot fluid lumen devices. In the '540 disclosure, Lee describes a balloon catheter designed for remodelling a body lumen. This device utilizes a multilumen catheter which is capable of delivering heated fluid to an expandable balloon lumen, thereby expanding the balloon geometrically and heating tissue which is in contact with the balloon. In the '321 disclosure, Lee describes a similar device wherein the lumen of an expandable balloon is filled with thermoplastic material which is designed to become softer and more moldable when heated by a heating element.
Endometriosis, another abnormal wall tissue condition, is associated with the endometrial cavity of the female. This medical condition, characterized by dangerously proliferative uterine wall tissue along the surface of the endometrial cavity, has been treated by delivering energy to the tissue. U.S. Pat. No. 5,449,380 to Chin discloses a medical device for delivering energy to the wall tissue of a diseased endometrial cavity using a balloon lumen with heated fluid circulating therein. Other devices, such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,505,730 to Edwards; U.S. Pat. No. 5,558,672 to Edwards et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 5,562,720 to Stern et al. are designed for treating particular tissues using heat generated by the flow of RF current between electrodes.
Diseased or structurally damaged blood vessels may bring about various abnormal wall conditions. The inducement of thrombosis and control of hemorrhaging within certain body lumens such as vessels have been the focus of several disclosed devices which use catheter-based heat sources for cauterizing damaged tissues. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,449,528, for example, Auth et al. disclose a thermal cautery probe designed for heating specific layers of tissue without producing deep tissue damage. The mechanism of heat generation in this device is a resistive coil within the cautery probe which is electrically connected to a power source. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,662,368, Hussein et al. disclose a device designed for localized heat application within a lumen. In this device, energy for heat generation is delivered to the tip of the device in the form of light by a flexible fiber. Heat from an element which converts light energy to heat energy is then conducted to the adjacent tissue. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,522,205, Taylor et al. disclose a device designed for inducing thrombosis in a blood vessel comprising an array of electrodes mounted onto an expandable balloon which may be delivered by a catheter. The inventors of this device hypothesize that when direct current flows through electrodes which are in contact with adjacent tissues, thrombosis is precipitated.
Maintenance of patency in diseased lumens such as blood vessels has been the focus of several disclosed devices, several of which may be characterized as cardiovascular stents. U.S. Pat. No. 5,078,736 to Behl, for example, discloses an apparatus for maintaining patency in the body passages comprising a stent structure which may be connected to a radiofrequency power source. In addition to mechanically supporting a body lumen, this device may provide for thermal disruption of the adjacent tissues which may inhibit reocclusion of the lumen. U.S. Pat. No. 5,178,618 to Kandarpa discloses a similar device which may be used for recanalizing an occluded vessel prior to mechanically supporting a lumen region.
Atrial Fibrillation
Cardiac arrhythmias, and atrial fibrillation in particular, persist as common and dangerous medical ailments, especially in the aging population. In patients with normal sinus rhythm, the heart, which is comprised of atrial, ventricular, and excitatory conduction tissue, is electrically excited to beat in a synchronous, patterned fashion. In patients with cardiac arrhythmia, abnormal regions of cardiac tissue do not follow the synchronous beating cycle associated with normally conductive tissue in patients with sinus rhythm. Instead, the abnormal regions of cardiac tissue aberrantly conduct to adjacent tissue, thereby disrupting the cardiac cycle into an asynchronous cardiac rhythm. Such abnormal conduction has been previously known to occur at various regions of the heart, such as, for example, in the region of the sino-atrial (SA) node, along the conduction pathways of the atrioventricular (AV) node and the Bundle of His, or in the cardiac muscle tissue forming the walls of the ventricular and atrial cardiac chambers.
Cardiac arrhythmias, including atrial arrhythmia, may be of a multiwavelet reentrant type, characterized by multiple asynchronous loops of electrical impulses that are scattered about the atrial chamber and are often self propagating. In the alternative or in addition to the multiwavelet reentrant type, cardiac arrhythmias may also have a focal origin, such as when an isolated region of tissue in an atrium fires autonomously in a rapid, repetitive fashion. Cardiac arrhythmias, including atrial fibrillation, may be generally detected using the global technique of an electrocardiogram (EKG). More sensitive procedures of mapping the specific conduction along the cardiac chambers have also been disclosed, such as, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,641,649 to Walinsky et al. and WO 96/32897 to Desai.
A host of clinical conditions may result from the irregular cardiac function and resulting hemodynamic abnormalities associated with atrial fibrillation, including stroke, heart failure, and other thromboembolic events. In fact, atrial fibrillation is believed to be a significant cause of cerebral stroke, wherein the abnormal hemodynamics in the left atrium caused by the fibrillatory wall motion precipitate the formation of thrombus within the atrial chamber. A thromboembolism is ultimately dislodged into the left ventricle, which thereafter pumps the embolism into the cerebral circulation where a stroke results. Accordingly, numerous procedures for treating atrial arrhythmias have been developed, including pharmacological, surgical, and catheter ablation procedures.
Conventional Atrial Arrhythmia Treatments
Several pharmacological approaches intended to remedy or otherwise treat atrial arrhythmias have been disclosed, such as, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,673,563 to Berne et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,569,801 to Molloy et al.; and also by Hindricks, et al. in "Current Management of Arrhythmias" (1991). However, such pharmacological solutions are not generally believed to be entirely effective in many cases, and may in some cases result in proarrhythmia and long term inefficacy.
Several surgical approaches have also been developed with the intention of treating atrial fibrillation. One particular example is known as the "maze procedure," as is disclosed by Cox, JL et al. in "The surgical treatment of atrial fibrillation. I. Summary" Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery 101(3), pp. 402-405 (1991); and also by Cox, JL in "The surgical treatment of atrial fibrillation. IV. Surgical Technique", Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery 101(4), pp. 584-592 (1991). In general, the "maze" procedure is designed to relieve atrial arrhythmia by restoring effective atrial systole and sinus node control through a prescribed pattern of incisions about the tissue wall. In the early clinical experiences reported, the "maze" procedure included surgical incisions in both the right and the left atrial chambers. However, more recent reports predict that the surgical "maze" procedure may be substantially efficacious when performed only in the left atrium, such as is disclosed in Sueda et al., "Simple Left Atrial Procedure for Chronic Atrial Fibrillation Associated With Mitral Valve Disease" (1996).
The "maze procedure" as performed in the left atrium generally includes forming vertical incisions from the two superior pulmonary veins and terminating in the region of the mitral valve annulus, traversing the inferior pulmonary veins en route. An additional horizontal line also connects the superior ends of the two vertical incisions. Thus, the atrial wall region bordered by the pulmonary vein ostia is isolated from the other atrial tissue. In this process, the mechanical sectioning of atrial tissue eliminates the precipitating conduction to the atrial arrhythmia by creating conduction blocks within the aberrant electrical conduction pathways.
While the "maze" procedure as reported by Cox and others, and also other surgical procedures, have met some success in treating patients with atrial arrhythmia, its highly invasive methodology is believed to be prohibitive in most cases. However, these procedures have provided a guiding principle that mechanically isolating faulty cardiac tissue may successfully prevent atrial arrhythmia, and particularly atrial fibrillation caused by perpetually wandering reentrant wavelets or focal regions of arrhythmogenic conduction.
Modern Catheter Treatments for Atrial Arrhythmia
Success with surgical interventions through atrial segmentation, particularly with regard to the surgical "maze" procedure just described, has inspired the development of less invasive catheter-based approaches to treat atrial fibrillation through cardiac tissue ablation. Examples of such catheter-based devices and treatment methods have generally targeted atrial segmentation with ablation catheter devices and methods adapted to form linear or curvilinear lesions in the wall tissue which defines the atrial chambers, such as are disclosed in the following U.S. patents: U.S. Pat. No. 5,617,854 to Munsif; U.S. Pat. No. 4,898,591 to Jang et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,487,385 to Avitall; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,582,609 to Swanson. The disclosures of these patents are herein incorporated in their entirety by reference thereto.
Additional examples of catheter-based tissue ablation in performing less-invasive cardiac chamber segmentation procedures are also disclosed in the following articles: "Physics and Engineering of Transcatheter Tissue Ablation", Avitall et al., Journal of American College of Cardiology, Volume 22, No. 3:921-932 (1993); and "Right and Left Atrial Radiofrequency Catheter Therapy of Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation," Haissaguerre, et al., Journal of Cardiovascular Electrophysiology 7(12), pp. 1132-1144 (1996). These articles are herein incorporated in their entirety by reference thereto.
Furthermore, the use of particular guiding sheath designs for use in ablation procedures in both the right and/or left atrial chambers are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,427,119; 5,497,119; 5,564,440; 5,575,766 to Swartz et al. In addition, various energy delivery modalities have been disclosed for forming such atrial wall lesions, and include use of microwave, laser, and more commonly, radiofrequency energies to create conduction blocks along the cardiac tissue wall, as disclosed in WO 93/20767 to Stem et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,104,393 to Isner et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,575,766 to Swartz et al, respectively. The disclosures of these references are herein incorporated in their entirety by reference thereto.
In addition to attempting atrial wall segmentation with long linear lesions for treating atrial arrhythmia, ablation catheter devices and methods have also been disclosed which are intended to ablate arrhythmogenic tissue of the left-sided accessory pathways, such as those associated with the Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, through the wall of an adjacent region along the coronary sinus.
For example, Fram et al., in "Feasibility of RF Powered Thermal Balloon Ablation of Atrioventricular Bypass Tracts via the Coronary Sinus: In vivo Canine Studies," PACE, Vol. 18, p 1518-1530 (1995), disclose attempted thermal ablation of left-sided accessory pathways in Jo dogs using a balloon which is heated with bipolar radiofrequency electrodes positioned within the balloon. A 10 French guiding catheter and a 0.035" wire were provided in an assembly adapted to advance the ablation catheter into the coronary sinus from the jugular vein. Thermal ablation procedures were performed in the posterospetal coronary sinus and in the left free-wall coronary sinus with thermal inflations at either 70 deg, 80 deg, or 90 deg for either 30 or 60 seconds. In all cases balloon occlusion was confirmed using distal dye injection. A compliant silicone balloon was used which had a diameter range of 5-20 mm and a length range of 8-23 mm over a final inflation pressure range of 0.4 to 1.5 atms. Fram et al. discloses that the lesion depth of some population groups may be sufficient to treat patients with Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome.
Additional examples of cardiac tissue ablation from the region of the coronary sinus for the purpose of treating particular types of cardiac arrhythmias are disclosed in: "Long-term effects of percutaneous laser balloon ablation from the canine coronary sinus", Schuger CD et al., Circulation (1992) 86:947-954; and "Percutaneous laser balloon coagulation of accessory pathways", McMath L P et al., Diagn Ther Cardiovasc Interven 1991; 1425:165-171.
Focal Arrhythmias Originating from Pulmonary Veins
Atrial fibrillation may be focal in nature, caused by the rapid and repetitive firing of an isolated center within the atrial cardiac muscle tissue. These foci, defined by regions exhibiting a consistent and centrifugal pattern of electrical activation, may act as either a trigger of atrial fibrillatory paroxysmal or may even sustain the fibrillation. Recent studies have suggested that focal arrhythmia often originates from a tissue region along the pulmonary veins of the left atrium, and even more particularly in the superior pulmonary veins.
Less-invasive percutaneous catheter ablation techniques have been disclosed which use end-electrode catheter designs with the intention of ablating and thereby treating focal arrhythmias in the pulmonary veins. These ablation procedures are typically characterized by the incremental application of electrical energy to the tissue to form focal lesions designed to interrupt the inappropriate conduction pathways.
One example of a focal ablation method intended to destroy and thereby treat focal arrhythmia originating from a pulmonary vein is disclosed by Haissaguerre, et al. in "Right and Left Atrial Radiofrequency Catheter Therapy of Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation" in Journal of Cardiovascular Electrophysiology 7(12), pp. 1132-1144 (1996). Haissaguerre, et al. disclose radiofrequency catheter ablation of drug-refractory paroxysmal atrial fibrillation using linear atrial lesions complemented by focal ablation targeted at arrhythmogenic foci in a screened patient population. The site of the arrhythmogenic foci were generally located just inside the superior pulmonary vein, and were ablated using a standard 4 mm tip single ablation electrode.
In another focal ablation example, Jais et al. in "A focal source of atrial fibrillation treated by discrete radiofrequency ablation" Circulation 95:572-576 (1997) applies an ablative technique to patients with paroxysmal arrhythmias originating from a focal source. At the site of arrhythmogenic tissue, in both right and left atria, several pulses of a discrete source of radiofrequency energy were applied in order to eliminate the fibrillatory process.
None of the cited references discloses a circumferential ablation device assembly which is adapted to form a circumferential conduction block around the circumference of a pulmonary vein wall in order to treat focal left atrial arrhythmias originating in the pulmonary vein.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device with a circumferential ablation element that forms an equatorial band along the working length of an expandable element which has a length that is substantially less that the working length of the expandable element.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device with an expandable member which has a shape when expanded that is adapted to conform to a pulmonary vein ostium along a left ventricular wall.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device with an ablation element which circumscribes a radially compliant expandable element and which is adapted to form a continuous circumferential lesion in tissue over a working range of expanded diameters.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device assembly that includes a circumferential ablation element on an expandable member and also a linear lesion ablation element adjacent to the expandable member.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device assembly that includes only one a cylindrical ultrasound transducer which is positioned within an expandable balloon and which is ultrasonically coupled to a circumferential band of the balloon's skin to form an equatorial banded ablation element which is adapted to form a circumferential conduction block along a pulmonary vein.
Nor do the cited references disclose a circumferential ablation device assembly which includes a cylindrical ultrasound transducer which is positioned within an expandable balloon that is adapted, when adjusted to a radially expanded condition, to engage a pulmonary vein such that the cylindrical ultrasound transducer is positioned and is ultrasonically coupled to a circumferential band of the balloon's skin that circumscribes the ostium of the vein.